Taishi Archway

The Taishi Archway is located in Longmei Village, Leiming Town, Ding’an County. It was built in the early spring of 1574, the second year of Wanli. It was a monument erected by Yin Zhengmao, the right vice censor-in-chief, and Zhang Shouyue, the censor-in-chief who supervised Guangdong, for Wang Honghui, a national historian. Hence it is called Taishi Archway. The archway is 5.1 meters high in total and has three bays in width. The width of the central bay (excluding columns) is 2.84 meters, and the width of the side bays (excluding columns) is 1.3 meters. The frontal stone of the Taishi Archway is 80 centimeters wide and 3.1 meters long. Between the roof and the frontal stone, there is a vertical stone engraved with the two characters ‘Enrong’. On the front side of the frontal stone, the regular script characters ‘Taishi Archway’ are engraved in intaglio horizontally in the middle. On the right side, small regular script characters are engraved vertically and read ‘Yin Zhengmao, the governor of grain supplies in Fujian and Guangdong, the minister of military affairs who supervises Guangdong and also the right vice censor-in-chief, and Zhang Shouyue, the censor-in-chief who supervises Guangdong erected this’. On the left side, small regular script characters are engraved vertically and read ‘Wang Honghui, the 20th place in the joint examination of imperial civil service examinations in the year of Yichou, the second year of Jiajing, a compiler in the Hanlin Academy, a scholar of the Wénlínlang rank, and a co-compiler of national history. Built on an auspicious day in the early winter of the year of Jiayu, the second year of Wanli’. On the back side of the frontal stone, large regular script characters are engraved horizontally in intaglio and read ‘Jiewu Archway’. On the left side, small regular script characters are engraved in intaglio and read ‘Wang Honghui, the first place in the provincial examination in Guangdong in the year of Xinyou, the year of Jiajing’. Opposite the large columns in the central bay, there is a couplet engraved in regular script characters: ‘Stone pillars prop up the sky, beautifully giving birth to the Wuzhi Mountain in the South Sea. The jade terrace pierces the sky, shining brightly towards the North Star corresponding to the Three Terraces’. It is said that it was written by Dong Qichang, a famous calligrapher in the Ming Dynasty. (Dong Qichang was a student of Wang Honghui.)

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